


Getting dirty

by HetepHeres



Category: Downton Abbey
Genre: F/M, Humor, Lime, Naughty, Romance, hand play
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-22
Updated: 2013-11-22
Packaged: 2018-01-02 08:31:43
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 578
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1054674
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HetepHeres/pseuds/HetepHeres
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sybil's laudry reveals a bit too much about herself (and Branson). <br/>They say no one knows you better than your servants. Probably because they wash your dirty clothes, clean up your mess and empty your trashbins. One-shot.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Getting dirty

**Author's Note:**

> Takes place between episodes 2x07 and 2x08.

Anna Smith, head housemaid in Downton Abbey, thought it wasn't her place to judge any of the daughters of the family she was serving.

And as she herself had fallen in love with someone she shouldn't have even had a crush on in the first place (older and _married_ man, for God's sake!), she couldn't either come to judge Mr Branson, her fellow co-worker and family chauffeur for the Crawleys.

_But still_ … she thought while she was picking up Lady Sybil's laundry from her bed to get it washed, _I really should tell her she ought to be more careful and to watch out, for discretion's sake:_ since they came back from that inn where her sisters had tracked her down in a nightly chase, Anna had been regularly finding dark brownish stains looking suspiciously like finger marks on Lady Sybil's clothes.

And definitely _not_ the size of Lady Sybil's tiny hands.

Plus, dirty motor grease was a complete nightmare for a laundress.

Anna had also noticed how _he,_ who was generally so neatly clad and groomed, now sometimes had a rumpled collar, and how his tie was then leaning askew.

_Holy Mother!_ Those two needed either a bucket of icy water, or a ring around the finger.

Well, to be fair to them and according to their failed little getaway to Gretna Green, they had clearly rejected the first solution and opted for the latter.

And the sooner the better: last time, the smears were on the right sleeve of her pink blouse, above the elbow. Another time, on the cuff. And another, right in the middle of the back of her nurse uniform. Or on the back of its white collar.

And why on earth did Lady Sybil take her nurse uniform out from her wardrobe again? The war was over now, her services were therefore not needed anymore in the hospital nor here in the Abbey, which had come back to being a private family home again.

In fact, Anna reflected, Lady Sybil's collars seemed to particularly suffer from her (seemingly frequent) visits to the garage…

The maid stifled a giggle at the picture this very idea just conjured up in her mind, but also a slight sigh of envy: if only Mr Bates were not that stubbornly by-the-book about their own relationship!

Lucky Lady Sybil, indeed!

But _that!_ Anna wouldn't have believed that from either of them: this time, the brown smears were located… well…on her skirt, right, but more precisely on… well… right on the… the… the _posterior_. There was no other word for that. Well, yes, there was, and plenty of… which Anna knew, but there was no way she would use those to refer to her employers' daughter's. Even in mind. And Lady Sybil didn't deserve those.

But really, Anna should hint at her, in veiled terms of course, that Mr Branson's fingers could very well give them away! And she should warn her preferably _before_ those stains begin to show up in even more… personal places. While they were still showing up here and there on her dresses, blouses or skirts, but _not_ on her undergarments!

_Yet_.

Though Anna mischievously imagined what would happen if, while all the staff was gathered for tea in the servants' hall, a maid (or let's say, _herself_ ) "innocently" wondered aloud why there was brownish greasy spots on Lady Sybil's stockings.

And Anna would just _love_ to see Mr Branson's face at these words…


End file.
